Daily Archives: February 8, 2007

And not “nasty” as in the way Charlie Weis promised his Irish would play when Notre Dame hired him.

This was a day in which whispered accusations gave way to outright hostility, a day on which two prominent recruits dissed Notre Dame, and Illinois was left defending its recruiting practices after signing a top-15 class.

But skip the Zooker for a minute here. You know what really chaps Charlie Weis’ ass? Recruits.

For his part, Weis said the word “commitment” needs to be redefined in recruiting.

“If you’re married,” he said, “you shouldn’t be looking at other women.”

Weis said he would push for the creation of an early-signing period, so players who commit early would not be hounded by rival coaches. Weis would like that period to culminate with an Aug. 1 early signing date.

Even if the American Football Coaches Association cannot gain approval on that from the NCAA, Weis said he would change the way he solicits commitments in the future.

“No soft verbals, no silent verbals, no quiet verbals, OK?” he said. “Either you’re committed or you’re not committed. . . . I think we have to define exactly what the rules are.”

Dawg fans can probably guess who set Weis off like that:

Nothing, though, can top the tale of Chris Little, a 6-foot-5-inch, 342-pound lineman from Georgia who’s not related to Greg.

Little committed to Florida State on live TV during the Jan. 6 Army All-America Bowl. Then he switched to Notre Dame, explaining that he was confused about his mother’s preference. On Wednesday he declared he would attend Georgia.

Evidently Little’s transgression was so great that it triggered this outburst from shameless recruiting expert and Notre Dame whore Tom Lemming:

“All’s fair in love and recruiting,” CSTV analyst Tom Lemming said, “but I’ve never seen anything like this. Some kids are more of a pain than they’re worth. The self-entitlement of some players now is completely out of control.”

Anybody wonder how Lemming felt about this when Little changed his commitment from FSU to Notre Dame in the first place?

Georgia expects a reserve of $20.4 million in “unallocated funds” from its $74 million budget. “You can’t call it profit with our debt service and facilities improvements,” Evans said. “But that’s significant.”

At least they’re being equal opportunity-like about the price hike:

The board also voted to raise prices for visiting teams’ fans.

Opposing teams will now be charged the same price for tickets that they charged Georgia fans the previous season. For example, Auburn charged Georgia $50 this past season while UGA only charged its fans the $32 the previous year.

So with the passing of National Signing Day, we’ve hit the first dead period of the year (when does spring practice start?). Before succumbing to the winter doldrums, here are a few things to absorb from yesterday:

Rust never sleeps: Urban Meyer is already getting his hooks into the class of 2009.

Judging from this, I don’t think Rodney Garner will be sending Antwane Greenlee a Christmas card this year.